Petition
for the
Oklahoma Office of the Attorney General
E. Scott Pruitt - 313 NE 21st Street, Oklahoma City,OK 73105
to evaluate the investigation of Pittsburg County Sheriff Joel Kerns into the death of four persons.

CC: District 18 District Attorney Farley Ward.

The petitioners would like to bring their concerns regarding an investigation by Pittsburg County Sheriff Joel Kerns. The investigation includes the recent deaths of four patients: Stacy Dawn Murphy, aged 20, who died at Narconon Arrowhead Oklahoma on 19 July 2012; Hillary Holten, 21, who was found dead at the facility on 11 April 2012; 32-year-old Gabriel Graves, who died there on 26 October 2011; and 28-year-old Kaysie Dianne Werninck, also a patient at Narconon Arrowhead, who was found dead on 3 March 2009.

The families and public have waited for closure, but have been disappointed to learn of statements and a general lack of action taken by Joel Kerns, that could lead a reasonable person to believe he is not capable or willing to resolve this matter. In fact his actions could appear to show favoritism to the institution that he has the duty to investigate and clearly his public statements have been not impartial.

Narconon, is an organization currently embroiled in controversy regarding its pseudoscience detox program for drugs and alcohol. A number of deaths, human rights complaints and criminal investigations around the United States and other nations have been well covered in the press. A number of Narconon Arrowhead staff have in fact lost their counseling certification, revoked by the National Association of Forensic Counselors (reported by Channel 2 KJHR) and the facility has reportedly been put on probation by CARF, the organization which certified Narconon Arrowhead. (MacLean’s magazine)

The Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation (OSBI) completed its investigation in to the death of Stacy Dawn Murphy and handed its findings back to Sheriff Kerns in July of 2012, he has also stated that he has conducted interviews and his investigation is ongoing.

Yet recently Sheriff Kerns has made statements to the press that makes it appear as if he is sitting on this investigation and could be protecting Narconon:
May 24, 2013 -- Fox News video interview of Sheriff Joe Kerns. "Everything we found seems to be in order. I know for a fact they are trying to save people's lives to get them off drugs." And "I would rather have a live Scientologist than a dead kid" (Naconon is a known Scientology front group.)

A review of call records to emergency services also show a disturbing history that should investigated by the state. These logs include:
A sexual assault on a staff member that Narconon refused to report to law enforcement and the perpetrator’s own father had to report him.
A report of a staff member who was in fear of Narconon and he needed a police escort to collect his belongings after the death of Stacy Murphy.
Cases where individuals attempted to commit suicide and were not removed until other attempts were made to kill themselves. Narconon is not a mental health facility and has no authority to care for such people. No action taken by law enforcement.
Complaints of people trying to escape from Narconon and being held against their will, asking law enforcement to recover runaways, when they have no legal authority to do either.
Also there have been a number of interviews with ex-employees, patients, and supervisors of Narconon Arrowhead that have stated staff supplied drugs for money and sex and that Narconon held people’s medicine without the medical authority to do so and other like abuses.

It has also come to light that two depositions have been taken in the civil lawsuit regarding the death of Stacy Dawn Murphy. Each of these Depositions were approximately six to seven hours in contrast to a Pittsburg County deputy sheriff only speaking to one of these persons for about fifteen minutes. The lawyer conducting the depositions was Gary L Richardson RRBK PLLC Law Tulsa, Oklahoma 74136 (former US Attorney, head of investigations for the State of Oklahoma Insurance Dept, and former State Prosecutor.) He has publicly expressed outrage over the comments made by Sheriff Kerns and the lack of action by his department. He has also indicated that those he deposed had information that would be of value in a criminal investigation but were never or poorly explored by the Pittsburg County Sheriff’s Department.

In the face of overwhelming evidence about the bad conduct and unethical behavior of Narconon Arrowhead and Sheriff Joel Kerns statements, how can anyone believe he could be acting in good faith? Lastly Narconon Arrowhead is the largest employer for the town that it is located in (Canadian OK) and Sheriff Kerns is an elected official for that area; there are obvious concerns there as well that call for an independent state level investigation. Therefore the petitioners are informing your offices that action must be taken to resolve this matter and we are publicly calling for you to take charge of this case and ensure the public trust.

In the last 16 years I have written eleven letters to the state health department about Narconon, and three letters to the state education department about ABLE in the schools. I have never received one single response.